Leveson looks back while the media moves on

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Dull papers never survive and a shackled press can’t win the battle with its electronic rivals

Lord Justice Leveson’s report is apparently the seventh on the press to be published in my lifetime. I can remember some of the earlier ones, particularly the Shawcross Report of 1962, written by Lord Shawcross in his lucid and precise legal prose.

Each successive report entertained the hope of solving the problem of regulating the competitive instincts of the news trade with the reality of the working media; none has been successful. Most, if not all, have been a fair summary of the state of the press at that time and have therefore been received with respect by editors. I